A Second Look 6-29-11

A Second Look around the yard this week found these things.

Yellow day lily. Can you find the green bug (katydid nymph)?

Deer have eaten day lily buds causing the brown stalks.

Yellow trumpet lily

Volunteer marigold in zinnia bed.

The baby bunny is venturing out more.

Hydrangea, Endless Summer

Double day lilies

Trumpet Lily (Lilium regal) with bumble bee.

Check this out

Here's another video from YouTube involving a billiards shot. Even if you aren't interested in pool, this is pretty amazing to watch. Almost 7 million people have already seen it, but in case you are one of the few who haven't, check out this link. 

The most amazing pool shot ever

Enjoy!

A History Lesson

My history education hasn't been very good—both from my schooling and my own initiation. So, I have vague ideas about a lot of things but don't understand much completely. This was evident during my recent visit with Ward to Fort McHenry in Baltimore. I knew that Francis Scott Key wrote the Star Spangled Banner there while he was watching bombs bursting in air, supposedly to the tune of an old English drinking song. But I never knew the rest of the story.

A replica of Key's Star Spangled Banner at Fort McHenry

Picture it. September 1814 during the War of 1812. The British have just burned the Nation's Capital and the people of Baltimore are frightened. The British Navy is amassing in the Chesapeake Bay and they are coming for Baltimore next if they can get by Fort McHenry. Meanwhile, Francis Scott Key, a young Georgetown lawyer, has taken a ship out among the British to negotiate for the release of Dr. William Beanes, who is a prisoner of war. 

The British start bombing the fort and the Americans return their fire. Francis is forced to stay among the British ships and can do nothing but watch the massive battle. For twenty five hours the exchange goes on. The firing finally stops and the battle has been won. But by whom? He anxiously awaits to see which flag will be flying over the fort: the Union Jack or the Stars and Stripes. When dawn brakes, it is a tremendous relief for him to see the Star Spangled Banner still flying. Francis Scott Key, overcome with emotion, is inspired to capture the feelings of the experience by penning the Star Spangled Banner.

There are many more details, that I can't quite remember, but the words of our National Anthem now have more meaning for me.

"Oh, say can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?
Whose broad stripes and bright stars thru the perilous fight,
O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.
Oh, say does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?"

Mmm, mmm good

Thanks to Theodore for a great supper tonight.

    

Food Waste Friday 6-24-11

It's time for Food Waste Friday, when the Frugalgirl encourages us to post pictures from the previous week of wasted food from our household. This accountability hopefully will help us to be more careful with our food and maybe save some money. 


Here it goes for this week.

The bread molded.

For the first time in a couple of years, we had molded bread. I'm not sure what happened, but even with the best of intentions, things can get way from you.


However, the biggest waste resulted from a trip to Costco with my son when we were both hungry. Among other things, we purchased a two pound bag of potato chips and two pounds of spinach dip. Even though the family ate everything, it was definitely more than we needed. This resulted in the double whammy of wasted money and wasted calories. Next time we'll try to remember the rule of never go food shopping when you're hungry.

Tasty, but too many chips and too much dip.

A Second Look 6-22-11

A Second Look around the yard this week found several new day lilies blooming.  Also, there are pictures of one of the squirrels eating from our suet feeder. After several trial and errors, the squirrel has perfected his methods. He hangs on the feeder, bends upward to take a bite, then hangs upside down to chew it.

Day lily

Mulberries are starting to ripen.

Day lily

Balloon Flower (Platycodon) You can see from the buds on either side of the bloom why they call it balloon flower. The bloom got a bit washed out from rain the night before.  

Day lily

Up for a bite.

Down for a chew.

Happy Father's Day

When I was little, my father was larger than life. He did the obvious of working hard and providing for our needs, but it was the other things I noticed. Youth is like that. Nothing could equal the thrill I got from riding on his shoulders, or the feeling of flying when he pushed me in the tree swing. I loved carrying his lunch pail and was proud when I could stretch my legs to match his stride. When I got too big to ride on his shoulders, he made things fun in other ways. He fixed the lights at the local swimming pool so we could swim all summer for free. He made sure we always had ice cream. Every night, we could have as big a bowl as we wanted because there was always more.

Then there was the summer I turned thirteen when I was at camp on a week long canoe trip. One night we ended up camping unscheduled in a farmer's field because of a sudden thunderstorm. We got permission from his sons to camp in their field, but not from their father because he wasn't home. As we were pitching our tents, the dad showed up and was quite upset about our trespassing. After a bit of explanation and negotiation, he said we could stay the night. However, it was obvious that he wasn't happy about it.

After things had calmed down a bit, I mentioned that my family used to live in the area. He asked a couple of questions and soon realized who my father was. His face lit up because my father used to be his fishing buddy. He said that Red (my father's nickname) was a fine man. The farmer said no more, but soon his sons showed up. They carried our water, gathered our firewood, and did anything else they could think of to help. So even though he wasn't there, my father was still making things right. He turned what could have been a tense, difficult night into a good one.

Vanilla ice cream was the family favorite.

On this Father's Day, I want to thank my father for watching out for me in many different ways, and for making sure that we always had ice cream.

Food Waste Friday 6-17-11

It's time for Food Waste Friday, when the Frugalgirl encourages us to post pictures from the previous week of wasted food from our household. This accountability hopefully will help us to be more careful with our food and maybe save some money. 


Here it goes for this week.

I knew that I had better check on the bag of carrots and the bag of potatoes we had. I had an uneasy feeling about them and I was right. Some of them went into a tasty soup, but it was a little too late for others as you can see. Next week, we had better eat the rest or you will be seeing another picture like the one below.

Check this out

Recently, Grand Rapids, Michigan, was told that it was a dying city. The city took exception to that statement and made this video to show how very much alive they are. Over three million people have already viewed their work. In case there are few of you out there that haven't seen it, here's a link.

Grand Rapids LipDub

Enjoy!

A Second Look around the Yard 6-15-11

A Second Look around the yard this week found these things.

This is one of the adult rabbits we see frequently. Recently, we have seen three baby bunnies that have just started to come out of their hiding places and play.

Day Lily, Stella Dora

Astilbe

Hosta, June

Lamb's Ear

Cabbage White butterfly on coreopsis bloom (head on view)

First Coneflower of the season

Coreopsis and Blanket Flowers

Meet Leo

It's time to meet another one of our cats, Leo. You may remember that he is the litter mate of Annie and housemate of Lucy.

This is the eye he uses to watch the birds.

This is the paw he uses to poke the other cats trying to get them to play.

This is the nose he uses to sniff out the catnip toys.

This is the paw he uses to hang onto Ward as he carries him on his shoulder.

This is the tail he twitches when he's watching a squirrel.

This is the whirr he causes as he runs away from most things.

Put them altogether and you get Leo.

Strawberries for Now

It's strawberry season. That time when the aromatic, sweet, and juicy strawberries are ripe. We were very fortunate, this year, because Aunt Martha had a lush strawberry patch that she shared with us. We quickly consumed the first batch of berries she gave us, but luckily, we were invited to pick more.

Strawberries from Aunt Martha

Wally was excited with this prospect and started discussing everything we could do with them—make strawberry short cake, make smoothies, make jam and the list went on. So we set off one afternoon to go picking. As we were picking, Wally asked me if I remembered one of his favorite books from when he was a child called Blueberries for Sal. In this book, a little girl named Sal goes blueberry picking with her mother but finds herself eating the berries faster than they can fill the bucket. He said that he was reminded of the book because he was doing somewhat of the same thing. However, we did end up with some to take home.

When we poured our berries into a container, there weren't as many as we had hoped for, but we still planned to make strawberry jam. However, when I returned to the kitchen a couple of hours later, all of the berries were gone. I guess the fresh berries were just too tempting.

Now you see them.       Now you don't.

I started to be annoyed, but changed my mind. We could enjoy the strawberries now or we could enjoy them later, and I guess now was okay. I reminded myself about the practice that is hard for me—being in the moment. That helped. Then I didn't feel so guilty about my part in the disappearing berries.

Food Waste Friday, 6-10-11

It's time for Food Waste Friday, when the Frugalgirl encourages us to post pictures from the previous week of wasted food from our household. This accountability hopefully will help us to be more careful with our food and maybe save some money. 


Here it goes for this week.

Five half filled cans of soda and the mysterious hommus container.

It was an interesting week. Wally finally cleaned out a month's worth of soda cans from his room and out of the 28 he put in the recycling bin, 5 of them were half full. That resulted in soda down the drain. Next, when I was searching the refrigerator, I found an old container of hommus. This surprised me because I thought we had totally cleaned out the fridge a couple of weeks ago. However, when I pulled it out, I found it was essentially empty. The question then became, who put the empty hommus container back in the refrigerator. I suspect it was the same person who puts the ice cream box back in the freezer with only one spoonful of ice cream in it. Oh well, kids will be kids. And very big kids, will still be kids sometimes. We are going to have to reiterate some house rules.

Brown celery

Also, one of the victories that I thought I had last week of salvaging celery and putting it in a soup and a salad was only half realized. The celery got too old to eat before the salad was finished so it had to be picked out and thrown away.

Now, it's off to another week of looking in the back of the fridge and eating leftovers when we are hungry. And that's a good thing.

A Second Look around the Yard, 6-8-11

A Second Look around the yard this week was scary as I found several invasive vines ready to take over the world or at least the trees and plants they were near. I found poison ivy, Virginia creeper, Japanese honeysuckle, wild grape, trumpetcreeper, mile-a-minute, and bindweed vines.  All I can say is, "Danger, Danger Will Robinson."* If you see any of these in your yard, pull them immediately.

Poison ivy with its typical three leaves.

Japanese honeysuckle. Did you know that the flowers start out white and fade to yellow?

Bindweed (wild morning glory) Its roots can be as far as 30' underground.

Trumpetcreeper. This was originally planted by a previous owner who liked its orange flowers. However, it has since become out of control.

Virginia creeper. This is often mistaken for poison ivy. However, there are two important differences: it has five leaves instead of three and handling it does not make you itch.

Wild grape vine

Mile-a-minute. This vine with the interesting triangular leaves also has thorns.

This picture has at least three of the vines mentioned above. Can you name them?

If you want more information on invasive vines, go to the USDA site on invasive plants or check out the Ortho book, Controlling Weeds. Of the many books I have read on weeds, I found this one the most useful.

*Does anyone remember Lost in Space and what the Robot always said to Will when there was trouble?

Food Waste Friday

I was recently introduced to Food Waste Friday which encourages you to post pictures of the food that has gone to waste during the week. I thought that I would give it a try to see if it made us more careful with how we use our food. The plan was to start posting last week, but the refrigerator clean up we did yielded too many things for me to show without being embarrassed.  So, I decided that I would start this week with a relatively clean slate.

Knowing that I was going to post pictures on Friday, definitely motivated me. The soon to be rubbery celery was put into salad and soup just in the nick of time. The family got tired of the soup before it was gone, so I traded it with my sister for some fresh strawberries. When all was said and done, here's what is going to be thrown away this week.

Corn chips that we overcooked and a peanut butter sandwich that got lost in my desk at work.